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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27519175">A Transfer by Any Other Name</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/firelord65/pseuds/firelord65'>firelord65</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Tales from the Pit [17]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Divergent (Movies), Divergent Series - Veronica Roth</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Character Study, Gen, Names, Prompt Fic, shortfic</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2017-11-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2017-11-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-08 05:08:30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,199</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27519175</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/firelord65/pseuds/firelord65</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Tris considers not making her name change official in the faction.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Tales from the Pit [17]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2011174</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>A Transfer by Any Other Name</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lysore/gifts">Lysore</a>.</li>



    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Lysore prompted: The name changing thing felt really important in the books so maybe you could do something where Tris tells Eric (or someone else, the BFF with Richards was very nice to read) that if he wants to, he can also call her Beatrice? Because the use of her full name is a gift she allows only to people she feels very close to?</p>
<p>I have some strong feelings about Tris' name, which may be apparent in how I chose to fill this prompt XD Sorry that I didn't hit exactly all the notes you were looking for.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>I chewed on a bit of jerky as I scrolled through the list of Initiates this year. It had fallen on my shoulders as the newest in the office and therefore lowest on the totem pole. I had to file all the appropriate paperwork for our newest tentative members, and I began to understand why Eric complained about it.</p>
<p>Medical files had been forwarded to our office at random intervals. Some included previous family histories making the computer in my office whir painfully loudly as it downloaded every byte. Two had come by courier in paper form, forcing me to transcribe them over digitally. Still others were single files with a birth date and some inoculations listed alphabetically without any other date listed. It was my responsibility to take all of this information and file it away with our new Initiates.</p>
<p>What made it even more complicated was the fact that everything I received was by prior name. Part of my job was to <em> also </em> reassign files to the initiate’s new name - if they’d taken one. Annabelle Williams now went by the far less farm-girl sounding Anne Wills. Craig Jetson got rid of his entire first name and had decided to be called Jet. There was a whole separate form for those who were forgoing a family name, for the sake of maintaining the family record. One that I was entirely out of.  </p>
<p>I rolled my chair out from the bullpen to coast up to Kyle’s desk. “How’s my favorite ex-officemate?” I asked. Now that I was out of training, ironically I lost the tiny scrap of office space that I and the other trainee’s had shared with him. Not that any of them had used the space anyways, but that was probably their own fault for not taking advantage of an actual door that shut.</p>
<p>The dark haired secretary twisted his head to look at me. “I don’t have any more of those soft caramels, so you can stop that right off, Prior” he drawled.</p>
<p>“Ouch,” I breathed, pressing a hand over my heart. “I’m Prior today? Not even Tris?”</p>
<p>“You’re doing paperwork which means in about three hours <em> I’m </em> going to be doing paperwork auditing,” he sighed. “That makes you Prior today. Especially since it’s shitty Candor legal-ese papers.”</p>
<p>He had me there. “I would offer to help-” I started to say, but he’d already started waving the suggestion away. “I know, I know. It’s auditing and you can’t audit yourself.”</p>
<p>“Get your pretty blonde boyfriend to help and maybe you can be Tris again,” Kyle teased.</p>
<p>I leaned on his desk and tipped my head to mirror how his was propped on one palm. “If I get him to do the auditing instead of you, can I be Beatrice?”</p>
<p>Kyle blinked twice in rapid succession. “Why would you want to be an old Abnegation grandmother?”</p>
<p>“That’s my name. Beatrice. Tris is just a nickname,” I answered. “I just… People I’m close to can call me that without it being weird? I thought I’d told Rich awhile ago. Figured he would have mentioned it by now.” I’d thrown him off of his game. Normally that would have made me crack a smile in pride. Something in how his eyes were darting over my face now unsettled me.</p>
<p>I asked for the name change form I needed and rolled away before he had the chance to be any weirder. The nagging feeling stuck in the back of my head any time that I looked up from my work for a break.</p>
<p>Staring at Jet’s paperwork made me realize something that I hadn’t considered before. What was my name, according to Dauntless’ records? Was I still Beatrice Prior, like I’d thought?</p>
<p>A few clicks in the program I was logged into brought me out of this year’s initiate directory. The folder from two years earlier held my initiate class. I scrolled past Al’s files as quickly as possible in an effort to keep the tall boy in my head where he belonged. My name didn’t crop up next, and it wasn’t until I’d passed Peter that I spotted my name.</p>
<p>
  <em> Tris Prior. </em>
</p>
<p>My stomach flipped slightly. Seeing it there in green text was more impactful than hearing it every day. I drew up a new name change form and began to fill in the lines with my information.</p>
<p>My hand stilled as I hovered over the NEW NAME line. Ink welled at the tip of my pen, threatening to stain the page. Four had said back on the day of the Choosing ceremony that if I changed my name, it would be my only chance. It wasn’t true; I was holding the evidence in my hand now.</p>
<p>
  <em> Drip. </em>
</p>
<p>I had said Tris and it hadn’t been the impulsive decision made in a rush of endorphins. I’d chewed over what it would be like to walk away from an Abnegation name like Beatrice before to drive back the slow boredom of service work.</p>
<p>
  <em> Drip. </em>
</p>
<p>It was reflexive to respond to Tris now, to embrace the girl that I’d decided on being when I fell down that pit.</p>
<p>
  <em> Drip-drip. </em>
</p>
<p>The line was ruined, ink running in chaotic patterns as it soaked into the fibers of the paper. I chucked the busted pen into the garbage. Next came the form, folded into quarters to be slid into paper recycling.</p>
<p>Later, when I was tucked under Eric’s arm and sitting on Richards’ couch, I found another spot of ink on my hand. I rubbed at it fruitlessly before sighing. “Hey Tris?” Kyle called from behind me. “Can I get a hand bringing in this cooler? My arms are about to fall off.”</p>
<p>I wriggled out from under my boyfriend’s arm, a smile back on my face. “So I’m back to Tris?” I teased. The cooler was stuck in the doorway as Kyle tried to fit himself and the plastic behemoth in at the same time. He rolled his eyes and nearly dropped the cooler on me.</p>
<p>“Keep it up or you’ll be down to ‘hey blonde girl,’” he groaned. It was an empty threat and I laughed instead.</p>
<p>“As long as it’s not Grandma, I’ll be OK,” I said, hefting the cooler on top of their small kitchenette table.</p>
<p>Kyle threw himself onto a chair, his arms dangling comically. “Can Gramma Bea get me a beer?”</p>
<p>I dug through the ice to find the stout that he drank. He popped it open on the edge of the table. We’d had conversations about how that would never happen on my furniture, but I had no control over how he treated his own stuff. “I actually thought about it,” I said quietly. “Looking it up, I was going to change my name back to Beatrice. But I couldn’t do it. I’d rather leave that name in the past, with my family.”</p>
<p>He paused partway through a long draw to study me once more. Then, he nodded, apparently satisfied with what he saw this time. “Good,” he grunted. “But I’ll miss the new nickname ammunition. I already had a plan for a bit of black and yellow modelling clay to cover your desk in tiny bees.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Previously a part of the "Tales from the Pit" compilation fic on my profile. Moving all of these to their own pieces in a series instead so they can be more accurately tagged on their own.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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